Adventure Training Day

Folks, as many of you know first-hand, the 4th of July Weekend was used to engage in an overtraining weekend, a part of which included an Adventure Training Day. ADT/ 4th of July had 3 objectives:

accomplish a significant training volume

mix up the routine sufficiently to not overdo any one discipline

be creative to make it fun and a bit “off the wall”

Here in the SF Bay Area, I felt like we did a pretty good job. Our formula was the tried and tested standard bike, run, swim, run, bike, run format, if you catch my drift.

Our route did not lack for scenic beauty as the bike took us up over Mt. Tam, down to Stinson Beach where Great Whites have attacked in each of the previous 3 summers, (this year just mere sightings so I think I can plan a Training Camp there), and then out to a trail head where we locked bikes and ran along a sea cliff before turning up into the hills and swimming in an alpine lake. Once we had lost sufficient feeling in our extremities, we exited the water and retraced our route where we finished with a barbecue.

A tough day to beat………………….. or so I thought.

It seems that Ryan Davenport, busy prepping IMUSA, took all of ADT’s objectives to the Next Level. Ryan is from the Boston area and is part of Team Psycho, and is also a regular training partner of Tyler Hamilton (hint: Tyler is the #2 guy on the US Postal Team at the Tour de France).

Ryan’s Progam: “Rode 2:20 ending at Walden Pond (yes, Thoreau’s pond), ran 53 min (got lost in trails and ran a bit longer than planned), swam 30 min, ran 29 min. (Negative split run on roads, out in 15:30, home in 13:30) swam out and back Walden (negative split again, out in 12:25, back in 11:10) then biked 1:15 home. Felt great all day, no nutrional issues at all.”

For those of you who did not read Ryan’s winter indoor training odyssey, I have attached it here once more. The guy’s got game!

Ryan’s Epic Winter Workout Since my landlords have complained about me biking in the house, I had to move my computrainer to the backporch. The backporch, although enclosed, is not heated nor insulated.

I have a thermometer on the porch which read 18 degree F at the start of my workout. I had to wear a hat, gloves, armwarmers, legwarmers, and jacket. After warming up or 20 min., I had to stop and put on booties because my toes were frozen.

The plan was EA11 but I was so cold that I was beginning to doubt that the workout would take place. However, by 35 minutes, I was actually starting to warm the porch up with my body heat and began peeling off layers. I started the workout and was going pretty good. . . steam was just flying off me and ice crystals formed on my shirt as I began to sweat hard.

Half way through the workout, the wind (which is gusting to 50mph here) blew the door to the porch open. Snow is now blowing around the room. I had to either stop the workout and get off the bike and close the door or continue. . . I continued. At this point I was only wearing bibshorts, HR monitor, and hat and gloves. I have the Beastie Boys blasting on the stereo and my neighbors, seeing the door open, came over to see what was going on. . . .I am afraid to think what I looked like at that moment. . . .

No one said anything to me, the just stared at me as I gritted my teeth and headed for L4. . . everytime I looked down, I hoped to look up and see no one watching. Eventually, my landlords came down and watched from the warmth of their house. . . . I had quite the audience.

I finished EA11 and sat up to spin for a little bit. I smiled at my neighbors and they waved and I could see the weird “what the hell is wrong with this kid” look on their faces. My landlords were gone. I put some clothes back on but they were frozen. I grabbed my water bottle but it had frozen as well. There was a 3 inch snow drift in the back corner of my porch.

I closed the door and wedged it shut with a shovel and went inside to take a shower. . . rather pleased with myself.

2 hours later, my landlords came down and said I could bike indoors if I liked.